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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23654800">jet black hair</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluetint/pseuds/bluetint'>bluetint</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Thrift Shop [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>GOT7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Age Difference, Coming of Age, Fluff and Angst, Growing Up Together, High School, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 22:48:28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,030</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23654800</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluetint/pseuds/bluetint</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Love isn't so easily dismissed.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kunpimook Bhuwakul | BamBam/Im Jaebum | JB</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Thrift Shop [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1703146</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>39</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>jet black hair</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>so this was something i started last year, in the middle of a thesis-induced breakdown, while listening to Anderson Paak's jet black hair on repeat. i thought a lot about it (in between reading boring articles on green supply chain management and doing other things) but wrote down very little. a few paragraphs, at best. suffice it to say, it went nowhere and probably never will, because consistency, length and quality? not something i'm going to achieve in this life time.</p><p>if it doesn't make sense to you, it's because it's not meant to, but i've listed the gist of it. what you have below is basically the the middle part and sort of ending of the fic. you're free to imagine the rest~</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>&gt; Age difference fic.<br/>
&gt; Bambam and Jaebeom growing up as neighbors<br/>
&gt; They both fall for each other but Jaebeom is keenly aware of their age difference and doesn’t want to encourage him (pining and suffering as a result!)<br/>
&gt; Lots of angst<br/>
&gt; Jaebeom graduates high school and goes to the army<br/>
&gt; Bambam being heartbroken but still supportive<br/>
&gt; No contact because that's what they’d both agreed on. Prior to Jaebeom enlisting, he and Bambam have a huge fight where Jaeb tells Bam is too young to be serious about love and Bambam is like ‘don’t fucking tell me what to do, don’t you dare invalidate my feelings and your own because we both know how we feel’ and they come to an agreement where they don’t contact each other for the duration of the enlistment. If they both feel the same way after Jaeb comes back and Bam is older, they’ll agree to give this thing between them a shot</p><p>--</p><p>
  <i>“Don’t go.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“I have to.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“But I love you,” he said.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“You’re not going to feel that way in a few years,” he answered. “You’re just a kid -”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Head snaps to the side as the punch lands. The force behind the punch belies his appearance.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Don’t fucking tell me how to feel.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“Don’t swear.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“I know what you’re trying to do but it’s not going to work.”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>A frustrated sigh. “Bam -”</i>
</p><p>
  <i>“I love you. Be safe.” And then he’s gone. </i>
</p><p>Im Jaebeom walks through the gates and comes out of the army two years later, with those three words echoing in his head like they did the day he went in.</p><p>---</p><p>(set a year or so after Jaebeom returns from the army)</p><p>“You know, you don't need to bring mum peanuts every time, you know, come over.” </p><p>Shells being pried open by delicate nails; nuts clanging as they fall into the metal bowl.</p><p>"It's the right thing to do."</p><p>"You mean the adult thing to do."</p><p>“No, I do it because I want to.”</p><p>“If you say so.”</p><p>“I do.”</p><p>“In that case, leave the skins on, she likes them that way.”</p><p>Neither of them like peanuts, by the way.</p><p>Jaebeom grunted in response, making Bambam smile at him from where he was fiddling away with his sketchbook that he took everywhere with him.</p><p>Graphite tipped fingers reach for his chin, tug his face up from where it's bent down to look at the peanuts. The glow of the setting sun made Bambam look golden, the glitter he’d smeared on for the party making him twinkle.</p><p>“Thank god you grew out your hair,” murmured Bambam, winding one of the soft, long strands around his finger. “I think my sister cried harder than I did when you shaved it off for the army…” </p><p>He trails off. Jaebeom’s eyes track Bambam’s gaze, wondering if he was going to try and kiss him.</p><p>There’s the sound of a throat clearing some feet away and Bambam pulls back, choosing to thumb at the eyebrow slit Jaebeom made in his brow in a fit of pique a few days earlier.</p><p>Without breaking eye contact, Bambam threw up a middle finger, making the crotchety old man who sat at the pier for the sole purpose of judging and silently damning them to hell, choke. Affronted and muttering loudly, the man packed up, leaving them alone at last.</p><p>“You know, I can think of better ways for a teenager to spend a Friday night,” said Jaebeom, as Bambam picked up the lead pencil and continued shading Jaebeom’s side profile like he hadn’t just disrespected a senior citizen.</p><p>Bambam snorted, blending the strokes near his chin with a pinky finger. “In this small town? I doubt that.”</p><p>The opening chords of Anderson Paak fill the air around him as he pulled out a cigarette from the pack in his back jeans pocket and lit up, closing his eyes as he let the smoke fill his lungs, and the music, his ears.</p><p>"So Mrs. Han tells us we only have a week to decide on our career paths and isn't that just absolutely wild? I mean,” Bambam makes an agitated motion with his whole body, “this woman barely shows up and when she does it is to berate us about our “cavalier attitudes” regarding our future. The nerve.” Here, he stops to stare thoughtfully into the distance, chin resting in graphite stained fingers. “Although I don't blame her, what with her absolute waste of a husband and her stingy in-laws. "</p><p>Normally, Jaebeom doesn't appreciate company at the end of his day. Even the guys at the shop know better than to engage him. He's averse to conversation, even more so to people. Being in the army hadn’t changed that. But Bambam, he thought, pushing the bowl away and ignoring the look the boy sent his way as he blew out a cloud of smoke, he was different. </p><p>Always had been.</p><p>The asphalt is tepid under him, heat soaking through the faded denim and into his skin. Bambam is wearing shorts, wiry arms wrapped around knobby knees. A bandaged finger picked at the scab on his leg as he talked. Jaebeom took a drag and flicked his fingers away from the scab.</p><p>Bambam put his hands down on the old sweatshirt Jaebum had given him when he saw Bambam was in his ‘party shorts’ that provided minimal protection from the hot concrete. He’d offered his jacket first, but even the thought of using a leather jacket that way had scandalized Bambam, leaving Jaebeom to offer up his shirt, leaving his upper half in an old vest with holes in it.</p><p>Bambam thought he was slick, but he really wasn’t, mused Jaebeom, watching the way his voice went up a pitch or two every time he moved, muscles flexing under the sheer undershirt.</p><p>“We have project submissions this week. I can't believe I'm about to graduate school. Like, I’m an adult. Me, an adult.”  The boy cleared his throat and continued to talk, twirling the pencil between his fingers, having moved on from Mrs Han.</p><p>Jaebeom smirked, lighting up another cigarette. "I can." </p><p>"Does this mean I'm allowed to smoke now?" </p><p>"No." </p><p>"Get drunk?" </p><p>"Your mother would have your head." </p><p>"Drugs?" </p><p>"I would have your head for that." </p><p>"Drive your car?" </p><p>"After you pass the test." </p><p>Bambam sighed, aggrieved. They're silent, watching the sun disappear. Bambam started up another sketch. Jaebeom finishes his second and lights up another. Then, "How about a kiss?" </p><p>"When you’re eighteen." The levity was tempered by a hint of firmness this time.</p><p>Bambam pouted. “You're no fun.”</p><p>“Never said I was.” </p><p>Blowing out a breath, Bambam toyed with the frayed edge of his notebook. A dog barked somewhere. Seagulls shrieked in the distance.</p><p>“You know, I was really nervous when I heard Hardass Park was going to grade my project. I’d heard things, you know, and everyone was so sure I wasn’t going to get accepted, but then I did, early acceptance too. I mean, I knew I was going to make, I’m <i>the man</i>, you know what I’m sayin?”</p><p>Bambam laughed it off, cocksure and chill, but they both knew that had not been the case.</p><p>(there were three months’ worth of text messages and calls that went into the night outlining his worries for the future, crumpled up gas receipts of late night drives and evenings out like this one)</p><p>Jaebeom despised a lot of things but nothing held a candle to what he felt whenever Bambam felt uncertain or lost. It didn’t… sit right with him. Bambam was one of those people who were always happy-go-lucky, who were rarely fazed by life’s adversities and somehow always managed to stand tall in the face of it.</p><p>“But you made it.”</p><p>“Hm?” Bambam had gone back to picking his scab again, embarrassed at having said too much. Jaebeom grabbed his hand, pulling his fingers away from the wound and twining their fingers together.</p><p>Mainly so he wouldn’t make it bleed again, Jaebeom told himself. But it was a lie, they both knew it.</p><p>“You made it. You’re going to college now.” He wasn’t vocal by any means, but somehow, when he was around this boy, this scrappy mess of too long legs and arms, quick mouth and even quicker brain, the words spilled out unprompted. There was a desperate urge to be heard. “You’re going to do great things, be the life of the party, the popular kid, and you’re going to find someone to date -”</p><p>“I already have that.”</p><p>Jaebeom let out a noise of barely contained frustration. “Bambam -”</p><p>Bambam wiggled closer, taking out a cigarette from the almost empty pack in the back pocket of his jeans and before sticking it in Jaebeom’s barely open mouth. “We’re not doing this now.”</p><p>He tried to say the words like always, ‘I’m too old for you’ but like always Bambam doesn’t let him, turning on the lighter, and Jaebeom tilted his mouth forward as a habit born out of smoking for years. There’s quiet as he inhaled, but it doesn’t feel as good as the others did, tongue sour from the taste. </p><p>“Bam -”</p><p>“Ssshhhh. Look at the moon, isn’t she pretty?”</p><p>The moon was indeed pretty but it didn’t hold a candle to the boy next to him.</p><p>---</p><p>It’s almost midnight when they pull up in front of Bambam’s house. They hadn’t spoken during the entire ride, but Jaebeom’s thoughts were still at the pier.</p><p>Guys like him don't have a future. They were free from the burden of a reputation or heritage to uphold. They simply worked hard without cause because they didn't know where else to put that energy, otherwise that restlessness would eat away at their insides. If not properly contained would destroy whoever dared came close.</p><p>Bambam on the other hand was different. He had passion. The drive to be better, do better, to make something of the life that had been given to him. Unlike Jaebeom, who had deemed the entire ordeal of living cumbersome and meaningless.</p><p>Jaebum slid a hand through Bam's hair. Took a minute to appreciate the fine dyed strands hair soft and silky despite the bleach before pulling him into an affectionate headlock. </p><p>“Yah,” whined Bambam, letting himself be manhandled despite being a foot taller than Jaebeom. “What was that for?”</p><p>The wristwatch read 11: 54. “Just felt like it. Hadn’t done that in a while.”</p><p>Bambam side-eyed him from the chokehold Jaebeom’s arms had him in. “You know….”</p><p>His grip on Bambam’s face reflexively tightened. He knew that tone. “What?”</p><p>“I’m taller than you now.”</p><p>Instincts told him to back up but common sense told him to hold tight. “Bam -”</p><p>“Which means… I can do <i>this</i>.”</p><p>And that’s when Jaebeom’s world tilts on its axis, the ground disappears from beneath his feet and reappears under his back and he’s lying in the wet grass and there’s stars twinkling in the midnight sky and Bambam’s on top of him, looking utterly satisfied as he pinned Jaebeom with all the weight in his noodle body.</p><p>“What the fuck -,” groaned Jaebeom, rubbing his head where it had come into contact with the soft ground. Or tried to, considering Bambam had his wrists pinned above his head and that his face was inches away from Jaebeom’s.</p><p>“Bambam.”</p><p>“You said I could do this after I became eighteen.”</p><p>Indecision wars with common sense. </p><p>“Hyung, we have approximately three minutes before my entire house starts a search party for me and Yugyeom is a great distraction but he can only do so much with what he has and you know how my mom is about surprise birthday parties. So are you going to let me have this or are you really going to make me wait some more like the jerk you have pretended to be all along?”</p><p>Jaebeom closed his eyes, body going slack. Admitting defeat in the face of the war that had been raging inside him ever since Bambam said those three words years ago. Tired of running away from what he wanted. “You deserve better.”</p><p>“Let me decide what I want, okay?” murmured Bambam before sealing his mouth over his.</p>
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